NGOs from five countries launch the “Minor Crimes Major Punishment” campaign to expand the protection of rights in criminal procedures in minor cases

ROMA – NGOs from five European countries – France, Germany, Hungary, Italy and Spain – including VOLUME e Rights Project in Italylaunched the campaign “Minor crimes Major punishment” to put an end to significant and unfair punishments for minor crimes, starting with the demand that procedural rights guaranteed by the EU – including the presumption of innocence, access to a lawyer, legal aid, interpreting and translation, as well as the protection of minors – also apply to minor crimes.

The approach towards minor crimes. Across Europe, people are increasingly criminalized and punished for alleged minor crimes, often without fundamental procedural rights. Misdemeanor enforcement disparately targets people from racialized communities, people in poverty, and others who are marginalized. These practices are widespread and the expected consequences are also very “severe,” meaning they have a significant impact on people’s lives, including insurmountable fines, prison time, and negative immigration consequences.

Criminalization in Italy. Even in Italy, the criminalization of minor crimes discriminates against marginalized groups and, in particular, migrants. In many cases these are perpetrators of crimes – such as petty theft, possession of small quantities of drugs or sale of counterfeit products – which often start with a small sanction, such as a fine, but evolve into significant additional sanctions and possible other consequences, including the ban on renewing the residence permit, expulsion and other administrative issues. If a person is subsequently expelled from the country and cannot afford the expenses, he or she risks an additional fine of 10,000 to 20,000 euros for the crime of “failure to comply with the police order to leave the territory after expulsion”. Therefore, a trial that starts from a “minor crime” triggers consequences that change the lives of these people in Italy.

The referees, the abuse, the discrimination. Reflecting a Europe-wide trend towards increasingly rapid and simplified legal procedures in the name of efficiency, accelerated procedures facilitate large-scale criminalisation, without due consideration of the underlying facts or injustices. This paves the way for arbitrary, abusive and discriminatory enforcement.

The powers of the police. In some places, widespread and discriminatory punishment persists in part because governments have expanded police powers so that the police themselves are relatively free from due process or the rule of law. Profiling by the police also means that people are disproportionately policed ​​because of their poverty, migration or social status, presumed racial, ethnic, national or social origins and identities, gender or sexuality, housing status and/or the intersection of these and other factors.

The “undesirables”. Some enforcement measures aim to remove people perceived as “undesirable” from public places, often with fines for crimes against public order. In other cases, people are sanctioned for so-called poverty crimes, such as traveling by train without a ticket or petty theft. People are routinely punished in drug-related cases, at odds with evidence-based practices such as substance regulation and harm reduction.

Violations of fundamental rights. The enforcement of petty crimes across Europe systematically violates people’s fundamental rights enshrined in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, including the right to an effective remedy and a fair trial (Article 47), the presumption of innocence and the right defense (Article 48), the principles of legality and proportionality (Article 49), the right to equality before the law (Article 20), the prohibition of discrimination (Article 22) and the freedoms of movement and residence (Article 45 ).

The EU exempts minor crimes from enforcement. European Union law allows for these realities in part because it exempts minor crimes from directives that guarantee basic procedural protections for individuals. The campaign calls on the EU to broaden the procedural rights directives to include minor cases among those covered by the protections guaranteed by the Charter of Fundamental Rights and calls on all candidates in the European Parliament elections to take a stand on this issue.